Freedom Index
![Screenshot of silhouette in NAZA film (The Guardian/JW Films)
NAZA, the new documentary film by Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor, is not the first filmabout Israel, by Israelis, to speak out of turn. But the unrestrained response to it in Israel,following the film being awarded the Special Jury Prize at the Venice Film Festival lastmonth, is unprecedented.
Israel’s minister of culture declared that he would take steps to have the filmmakers’citizenship revoked; angry protesters have demonstrated outside the homes of one of thefilmmakers’ parents; the offices of +972 Publications (the work builds on some of Abraham’s work for the news outlet) were evacuated after staff received credible threats of violence. Most tellingly, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared that people who “slandered” the country and Israel Defence Forces (IDF) at a time of war were “traitors”. Allthis before the film’s official release, scheduled for 14 October, and for a film that, as of thetime of writing, has not been seen by very many Israelis – and, almost certainly, not byanyone voicing their opprobrium in the public sphere. This speaks of one thing: censorship.
Yuval Abraham (right) and an interviewee seen during the NAZA documentary (The Guardian/JW Films)
On 7 October 2023, Hamas launched a multi-pronged attack on Israel, killing more than1200 people in one day and taking another 300 hostage. In the three years since, Israel haswaged an unrelenting and pitiless war against the two million residents of the Gaza Strip,killing at least 74,000 people and laying to waste much of the territory.
NAZA is the acronym in Hebrew for nezek agavi – collateral damage, a horrible euphemism that has bounced about since at least the Vietnam War. It is also, according to the film that carries this name, a protocol that has been deployed by the IDF over the course of the war.
Israel’s minister of culture declared that he would take steps to have the filmmakers’ citizenship revoked
When actualising remote strikes against Hamas targets, the protocol determines how many civilian deaths constitute an acceptable trade-off vis-à-vis the elimination (yes, anothereuphemism) of an identified Hamas target?
NAZA, the documentary is underpinned by a simple premise. 24 men and women, theiridentities disguised, are interviewed by Abraham on Tel Aviv rooftops about theirknowledge of the protocol, about the wider prosecution of the ongoing war, and about theirfeelings concerning how the war is being waged – the manner in which Gaza and Gazans have been laid to waste by the tools that they themselves have operated.
The documentary unpicks NAZA’s methodology, how this reduces human life to a mathematical calculation. One information source for the NAZA protocol is Lavender, an AI tool that extrapolates from telephone network data the likelihood that any given individual is a “Hamas operative” – and thus a target whose elimination becomes attached to a NAZA number. Concerning Lavender, one interviewee says that the AI tool has an 85% accuracy rate. The life of a target, and of the people around that target, hinges on a tool with a 15% error rate. This alone casts into stark relief the IDF claim that its war is against Hamas alone.
The impression one develops across the course of the film is that for some of theinterviewees, the depersonalisation created by NAZA helps in distancing oneself from theemotional and psychological implications of waging this particular war. It is, I think, a sentiment being replicated across Israel as a whole. Of the war in Gaza and how it is beingprosecuted, even now there is remarkably little debate in the public sphere. Very littlereflection, in the media or in the wider public discourse, about the consequences of waginga war in a manner that has ignited revulsion across the world.
NAZA’s principal audience, despite the rhetoric of “traitors”, is Israelis.
There is no single reason for this. One of the interview subjects talks of a “hormonal rush”,presumably connected to a primal wish for vengeance after 7 October. Several, with varying degrees of reflection, express some regret. One references all he had been taught about the Nazis and the Holocaust, then pauses. It is difficult, he continues, not to see parallels between that set of atrocities and these. One says that they – the people operating the NAZA protocol – “do not hate Arabs”. Abraham then reminds him of the number of people that NAZA potentially anonymises, then erases. He first obfuscates, then falls silent. Another talks about how hard it was for him to calculate a NAZA for a target – a target he believed to be legitimate – knowing that they would include his two daughters: “toddlers, one three [years old] the second not more than six.” He knew this because he had access to the target’s picture library on his phone. The target in question was not killed in the subsequent targeted strike. The daughters, part of the approved NAZA collateral damage calculation, were.
NAZA’s principal audience, despite the rhetoric of “traitors”, is Israelis. Contextual prods across the film are reminders of this. A single casual reference to the IDF’s elite 8200 cyber warfare unit, for instance, carries a lot of shorthand that would not be evident to non-Israelis. The rooftop settings for the interviews would be identifiable for many Tel Avivians, sometimes down to the very street. The point being driven home is that the people behind NAZA are relatable, part of the quotidian fabric of everyday life. A bifurcated life, though. One interviewee says that after selecting targets in HaKirya, the IDF’s central Tel Aviv headquarters, he may head off to meet friends on nearby Ibn Gvirol Street. Israel and many Israelis live in the shadow of the 7 October attacks but remain detached from the reality of the war being waged in their name in Gaza. Whether Israelis will get to see NAZA remains an open question. Abraham and Szor have said that they are open to discussing distribution terms with Israeli cinemas; the likelihood of any of them taking this up is slim. Whether or not the government will censor the film – quite plausible, given the rhetoric from above – is a moot point. In today’s Israel, I doubt that anyone will touch it with a barge pole. This weekend, Prime Minister Netanyahu wrote to his attorney-general and the heads of the IDF and the internal security agency, instructing that they “act urgently to uncover the identity of all those who are involved or appear in the libel film”, so that they may be prosecuted “for serious information security offenses, criminal defamation, and harming Israel’s diplomatic and security interests.” Making the film is being framed as treason; distributing it could easily be framed as much the same.
NAZA will be made available to stream, for free, after its international theatrical run. Whether Israelis will choose to watch it, even in private, is a question I can’t answer. One thing that must be said, though. That the film was made at all says something about a capacity for self-reflection that did exist in Israel once, even if it was often mocked or dismissed or taken for granted. But that was before 7 October 2023. NAZA is not the first film about Israel, by Israelis, to speak out of turn. I’m not at all sure whether it won’t be the last.
READ MORE](https://fsnn.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/Screenshot-2026-10-08-at-16.04.00-scaled-e1791821503283.png "Screenshot of silhouette in NAZA film (The Guardian/JW Films)
NAZA, the new documentary film by Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor, is not the first filmabout Israel, by Israelis, to speak out of turn. But the unrestrained response to it in Israel,following the film being awarded the Special Jury Prize at the Venice Film Festival lastmonth, is unprecedented.
Israel’s minister of culture declared that he would take steps to have the filmmakers’citizenship revoked; angry protesters have demonstrated outside the homes of one of thefilmmakers’ parents; the offices of +972 Publications (the work builds on some of Abraham’s work for the news outlet) were evacuated after staff received credible threats of violence. Most tellingly, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared that people who “slandered” the country and Israel Defence Forces (IDF) at a time of war were “traitors”. Allthis before the film’s official release, scheduled for 14 October, and for a film that, as of thetime of writing, has not been seen by very many Israelis – and, almost certainly, not byanyone voicing their opprobrium in the public sphere. This speaks of one thing: censorship.
Yuval Abraham (right) and an interviewee seen during the NAZA documentary (The Guardian/JW Films)
On 7 October 2023, Hamas launched a multi-pronged attack on Israel, killing more than1200 people in one day and taking another 300 hostage. In the three years since, Israel haswaged an unrelenting and pitiless war against the two million residents of the Gaza Strip,killing at least 74,000 people and laying to waste much of the territory.
NAZA is the acronym in Hebrew for nezek agavi – collateral damage, a horrible euphemism that has bounced about since at least the Vietnam War. It is also, according to the film that carries this name, a protocol that has been deployed by the IDF over the course of the war.
Israel’s minister of culture declared that he would take steps to have the filmmakers’ citizenship revoked
When actualising remote strikes against Hamas targets, the protocol determines how many civilian deaths constitute an acceptable trade-off vis-à-vis the elimination (yes, anothereuphemism) of an identified Hamas target?
NAZA, the documentary is underpinned by a simple premise. 24 men and women, theiridentities disguised, are interviewed by Abraham on Tel Aviv rooftops about theirknowledge of the protocol, about the wider prosecution of the ongoing war, and about theirfeelings concerning how the war is being waged – the manner in which Gaza and Gazans have been laid to waste by the tools that they themselves have operated.
The documentary unpicks NAZA’s methodology, how this reduces human life to a mathematical calculation. One information source for the NAZA protocol is Lavender, an AI tool that extrapolates from telephone network data the likelihood that any given individual is a “Hamas operative” – and thus a target whose elimination becomes attached to a NAZA number. Concerning Lavender, one interviewee says that the AI tool has an 85% accuracy rate. The life of a target, and of the people around that target, hinges on a tool with a 15% error rate. This alone casts into stark relief the IDF claim that its war is against Hamas alone.
The impression one develops across the course of the film is that for some of theinterviewees, the depersonalisation created by NAZA helps in distancing oneself from theemotional and psychological implications of waging this particular war. It is, I think, a sentiment being replicated across Israel as a whole. Of the war in Gaza and how it is beingprosecuted, even now there is remarkably little debate in the public sphere. Very littlereflection, in the media or in the wider public discourse, about the consequences of waginga war in a manner that has ignited revulsion across the world.
NAZA’s principal audience, despite the rhetoric of “traitors”, is Israelis.
There is no single reason for this. One of the interview subjects talks of a “hormonal rush”,presumably connected to a primal wish for vengeance after 7 October. Several, with varying degrees of reflection, express some regret. One references all he had been taught about the Nazis and the Holocaust, then pauses. It is difficult, he continues, not to see parallels between that set of atrocities and these. One says that they – the people operating the NAZA protocol – “do not hate Arabs”. Abraham then reminds him of the number of people that NAZA potentially anonymises, then erases. He first obfuscates, then falls silent. Another talks about how hard it was for him to calculate a NAZA for a target – a target he believed to be legitimate – knowing that they would include his two daughters: “toddlers, one three [years old] the second not more than six.” He knew this because he had access to the target’s picture library on his phone. The target in question was not killed in the subsequent targeted strike. The daughters, part of the approved NAZA collateral damage calculation, were.
NAZA’s principal audience, despite the rhetoric of “traitors”, is Israelis. Contextual prods across the film are reminders of this. A single casual reference to the IDF’s elite 8200 cyber warfare unit, for instance, carries a lot of shorthand that would not be evident to non-Israelis. The rooftop settings for the interviews would be identifiable for many Tel Avivians, sometimes down to the very street. The point being driven home is that the people behind NAZA are relatable, part of the quotidian fabric of everyday life. A bifurcated life, though. One interviewee says that after selecting targets in HaKirya, the IDF’s central Tel Aviv headquarters, he may head off to meet friends on nearby Ibn Gvirol Street. Israel and many Israelis live in the shadow of the 7 October attacks but remain detached from the reality of the war being waged in their name in Gaza. Whether Israelis will get to see NAZA remains an open question. Abraham and Szor have said that they are open to discussing distribution terms with Israeli cinemas; the likelihood of any of them taking this up is slim. Whether or not the government will censor the film – quite plausible, given the rhetoric from above – is a moot point. In today’s Israel, I doubt that anyone will touch it with a barge pole. This weekend, Prime Minister Netanyahu wrote to his attorney-general and the heads of the IDF and the internal security agency, instructing that they “act urgently to uncover the identity of all those who are involved or appear in the libel film”, so that they may be prosecuted “for serious information security offenses, criminal defamation, and harming Israel’s diplomatic and security interests.” Making the film is being framed as treason; distributing it could easily be framed as much the same.
NAZA will be made available to stream, for free, after its international theatrical run. Whether Israelis will choose to watch it, even in private, is a question I can’t answer. One thing that must be said, though. That the film was made at all says something about a capacity for self-reflection that did exist in Israel once, even if it was often mocked or dismissed or taken for granted. But that was before 7 October 2023. NAZA is not the first film about Israel, by Israelis, to speak out of turn. I’m not at all sure whether it won’t be the last.
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On 7 October 2023, Hamas launched a multi-pronged attack on Israel, killing more than
1200 people in one day and taking another 300 hostage. In the three years since, Israel has
waged an unrelenting and pitiless war against the two million residents of the Gaza Strip,
killing at least 74,000 people and laying to waste much of the territory.
NAZA is the acronym in Hebrew for nezek agavi – collateral damage, a horrible euphemism that has bounced about since at least the Vietnam War. It is also, according to the film that carries this name, a protocol that has been deployed by the IDF over the course of the war.
Israel’s minister of culture declared that he would take steps to have the filmmakers’ citizenship revoked
When actualising remote strikes against Hamas targets, the protocol determines how many civilian deaths constitute an acceptable trade-off vis-à-vis the elimination (yes, another
euphemism) of an identified Hamas target?
NAZA, the documentary is underpinned by a simple premise. 24 men and women, their
identities disguised, are interviewed by Abraham on Tel Aviv rooftops about their
knowledge of the protocol, about the wider prosecution of the ongoing war, and about their
feelings concerning how the war is being waged – the manner in which Gaza and Gazans have been laid to waste by the tools that they themselves have operated.
The documentary unpicks NAZA’s methodology, how this reduces human life to a mathematical calculation. One information source for the NAZA protocol is Lavender, an AI tool that extrapolates from telephone network data the likelihood that any given individual is a “Hamas operative” – and thus a target whose elimination becomes attached to a NAZA number. Concerning Lavender, one interviewee says that the AI tool has an 85% accuracy rate. The life of a target, and of the people around that target, hinges on a tool with a 15% error rate. This alone casts into stark relief the IDF claim that its war is against Hamas alone.
The impression one develops across the course of the film is that for some of the
interviewees, the depersonalisation created by NAZA helps in distancing oneself from the
emotional and psychological implications of waging this particular war. It is, I think, a sentiment being replicated across Israel as a whole. Of the war in Gaza and how it is being
prosecuted, even now there is remarkably little debate in the public sphere. Very little
reflection, in the media or in the wider public discourse, about the consequences of waging
a war in a manner that has ignited revulsion across the world.
NAZA’s principal audience, despite the rhetoric of “traitors”, is Israelis.
There is no single reason for this. One of the interview subjects talks of a “hormonal rush”,
presumably connected to a primal wish for vengeance after 7 October. Several, with varying degrees of reflection, express some regret. One references all he had been taught about the Nazis and the Holocaust, then pauses. It is difficult, he continues, not to see parallels between that set of atrocities and these. One says that they – the people operating the NAZA protocol – “do not hate Arabs”. Abraham then reminds him of the number of people that NAZA potentially anonymises, then erases. He first obfuscates, then falls silent. Another talks about how hard it was for him to calculate a NAZA for a target – a target he believed to be legitimate – knowing that they would include his two daughters: “toddlers, one three [years old] the second not more than six.” He knew this because he had access to the target’s picture library on his phone. The target in question was not killed in the subsequent targeted strike. The daughters, part of the approved NAZA collateral damage calculation, were.
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